ed in the glory of the sinking sun,
saw the mountains crowned far, far away with the impregnable city
and fortress of Masyaf, and below it the slopes down which they
had ridden for their lives. Nearer to them flashed the river
bordered by the town of Emesa. Set at intervals along its walls
were spears, looking like filaments against the flaming, sunset
sky, and on each of them a black dot, which was the head of an
Assassin, while from the turrets above, the golden banner of
Saladin fluttered in the evening wind. Remembering all that she
had undergone in that fearful home of devil-worshippers, and the
fate from which she had been snatched, Rosamund shuddered.

"It burns like a city in hell," she said, staring at Masyaf,
environed by that lurid evening light and canopied with black,
smoke-like clouds. "Oh! such I think will be its doom."

"I trust so," answered Wulf fervently. "At least, in this world
and the next we have done with it."

"Yes," added Godwin in his thoughtful voice; "still, out of that
evil place we won good, for there we found Rosamund, and there,
my brother, you conquered in such a fray as you can never hope to
fight again, gaining great glory, and perhaps much more."

Then reining in his horse, Godwin fell back behind the litter,
while Wulf wondered, and Rosamund watched him with dreaming eyes.

That evening they camped in the desert, and next morning,
surrounded by wandering tribes of Bedouins mounted on their
camels, marched on again, sleeping that night in the ancient
fortress of Baalbec, whereof the garrison and people, having been
warned by runners of the rank and titles of Rosamund came out to
do her homage as their lady.

Hearing of it, she left her litter, and mounting a splendid horse
which they had sent her as a present, rode to meet them, the
brethren, in full armour and once more bestriding Flame and
Smoke, beside her, and a guard of Saladin's own Mameluks behind.
Solemn, turbaned men, who had been commanded so to do by
messengers from the Sultan, brought her the keys of the gates on
a cushion, minstrels and soldiers marched before her, whilst
crowding the walls and running alongside came the citizens in
their thousands. Thus she went on, through the open gates, past
the towering columns of ruined temples once a home of the worship
of heathen gods, through courts and vaults to the citadel
surrounded by its gardens that in dead ages had been the
Acropolis of forgotten Roman emperors.